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It wasn't so long ago that having your e-mail immediately
forwarded to a wireless handheld seemed a bit excessive. But with
so many people chatting over IM systems in the office, the time
seems ripe for that still-more-timely messaging on the road as
well.

Cingular Wireless Interactive Messaging PLUS lets you text chat
on RIM BlackBerry
950 and 957 handhelds and Good Technology's G100 for $20 to $50 per month,
depending on usage. PLUS operates independently of the e-mail,
contact and other synchronization services from Good Technology and
RIM, so you can stay in touch with colleagues even if your
company's messaging server goes down. Alternatively, companies
running any of several BlackBerry models over Lotus servers could
choose IBM's Lotus Instant Messaging Everyplace 3 for a
one-time fee of $45 per user.

With message logging, tracking and archiving even for messages
to multiple recipients, both systems have a higher degree of
accountability than many desktop IM systems. Messages in transit
over Lotus IM happen to be protected by RIM's triple-DES
encryption. But resource-challenged handhelds make a poor hacker
target anyway, reassures Good Technology's group product
manager Rick Osterloh. Both Good Technology and RIM have IM plans
for Palm OS and Pocket PC handhelds and data networks other than
Cingular's Mobitex.